The Warrior Within

3. Nerd City

3

NERD CITY

About an hour later, as I lather away the sweat, my thoughts are still of Jo. This is how pitiful my life has become. A hot woman stands close to me and I practically have an o****m right there.

I find myself humming Fleetwood Mac’s “Think About Me.” The walking (and—though not literally this time—running into Jo) energized me a little. My lower back has loosened up significantly and I enjoy being more limber as I rub lotion into my skin. For a moment, I imagine Jo smoothing her hands over my body and bring myself forcefully back to the present.

I sink into my couch, and brush some color on my fingers and toes. Pleased with the result, I prop my lavender-tipped feet up on the coffee table to dry and settle in to the deep cushions to read. After I read the same paragraph several times and still don’t know what it says, I give up. Puffing in frustration, I black the screen and toss my e-reader onto the couch beside me, my eyes falling on the rose I carried out this morning. I just can’t stop thinking about Jo. As if the sexiest woman I’ve ever seen showing a little interest in me is strange! Okay. Who am I kidding? It really, really is.

In my teens and early twenties, thanks I guess to my shiny hair and a ready laugh, I received admiring looks and even dated a few times, though nothing serious as I was more focused on school. I dressed differently then, too, showing off my early blooming curves and accentuating my smaller waist. I’ve dated a little since then, but none of them really seemed to appreciate me,or held my attention.

Not like Jo.

When I attended James Madison University, my friends and I would travel to a gay bar in Washington, DC to dance our asses off. I wouldn’t sit down the whole night. Women would crowd around us, and let’s just say I really let loose when I dance and leave it at that. However, now just the idea of shaking my booty sends phantom nerve pain down my legs, and on the rare occasions when I do go out, I tend to stay at the table rather than risk the dance floor.

Believe me, I’m grateful I had those experiences. But this is my new reality. It’s been a long time since anyone other than close friends or Dad has looked at me with anything other than pity. It’s taken a long time, but I’ve learned to stop crying over what I’ve lost and accept it.

Mostly.

When the doctor told me I had Ankylosing Spondylitis I was floored. My mother’s much older brother had it. They were estranged, thanks to my mother, and I was just a kid when he found out he had it. I had the impression that it was an older man’s disease. Color me surprised to learn that it can actually strike men and women, and at any age. Like most people I knew, I thought of arthritis as something old people developed. But that is only one of many types. My eyes had been opened in the most painful way. I could be looking at life in a wheelchair in the not-so-distant future. At the very least, I may never have a truly pain-free day again.

My thoughts turn to how Jo leaves me speechless and off-center. I shake my head. I’m out of practice, but well, it’s just not like me. I pride myself on my independence and control. Feeling flustered is new to me, and I don’t think I like it.

Darcy leaps down from the window seat and up onto the coffee table. I shift to keep his hair off my toenails. My mind fills with Jo’s striking features…and impressive strength…lifting me effortlessly. Stop that. I shake myself, decide my toes are dry enough, and carefully stand. It’s time to bake.

I find myself humming a senseless tune as I go through the familiar motions of mixing chocolate-chip cookie batter, my mind replaying Jo at the club, and then again at the gas station. I stare through the pass-through island and out the picture window. When the oven timer goes off, I jump. I’ve zoned out staring out at the Red Maple across the parking lot. Laughing at myself, I pull out the tray, slide each golden cookie onto a cooling rack, and scoop out the remaining dough. Before I finish, my cell rings.

I “dash” into the bedroom and pull my phone off the charger, smiling when I see who’s calling.

“Hello!”

“Hey, girl! What are you up to?” Emma’s voice reflects her usual cheerfulness. We’ve been friends since middle school, and in all those years, I’ve rarely seen her without a smile.

“Hey, Em! Nothing much, I’m just baking cookies. But since I don’t want to eat them, I thought I’d take them next door for my neighbor’s kids. Want me to save you a handful?”

“When a bell rings, do angels get their wings? Heck, yeah, I want some. Listen, come have coffee with me this afternoon and you can bring them then.” She doesn’t have to say where. We only ever go one place for coffee.

“Hey, sure, that actually sounds great. Say two o’clock?”

“Done. See you then!”

I want to tell Emma about Jo, but what is there to tell her? I certainly can’t tell her about…

Yup. Flustered. And I definitely don’t like it.

I step into the cool, bright interior of Perk U Up with a smile on my face. My closest friend and I try to get together at least once a week, but with one thing or another, it has been nearly three weeks since we met up. Definitely too long. And, though I feel embarrassed about my adolescent-like behavior, the truth is, I need her perspective on whatever may or may not be happening with Jo. Emma is one of those rare people you can trust to tell you the truth.

I do a quick scan, but don’t see her. I order a house brew and splurge on steamed milk. After paying, I choose a two-top table in front of a window so Emma and I can people watch. As the server brings my coffee, Emma breezes in on a gust of warm air. I’m not the only one to notice, believe me. Emma is a rare beauty, and when she comes in a room, it’s like the air changes, brightens. Eyes all over the room follow her. No one is immune to her genuine smile and infectious laughter. Loads of wavy blond hair, big sparkling blue eyes, an athletic build, and a movie-star smile complete the picture. But I know that inside is a heart of gold. Her parents raised her to believe that true beauty lies within and she lives that belief. She is in love with life, and known among her friends for fairness and generosity.

Emma and I met after my family relocated when I was in 7th grade. We didn’t have any classes together that year, but we both joined the volleyball team. I was the new kid and already had eye-catching boobs I had to stuff into a suffocating sports b*a (what sadist came up with that particular t*****e device?). I didn’t fit into a group of already-skinny girls hellbent on fitting into tighter and smaller attire. They weren’t particularly hostile to me—we were a strong team after all, and Coach would have benched them if they had acted out—but they snubbed me in the halls.

Not Emma. Emma walked away when the gossip started and over to me, to chat me up. She insisted I sit with her at lunch. She told me about her parents. I told her about my mother. She invited me to her house for sleepovers, and understood why I couldn’t ask her over. As you can imagine, she was popular with everyone without even trying, which the other girls envied. But they couldn’t risk ostracizing her and alienating the boys. Ah, teenage angst.

Today, Emma’s long, tanned legs are encased in pressed white linen shorts that hang to mid-thigh, which she paired with a cool sleeveless ocean-blue silk top. Honestly, I don’t know how she keeps linen looking so good. It’s like magic. I have a linen skirt I love, but as soon as I sit down, the wrinkles are there to stay. Her recent pedicure looks great in strappy white sandals, the candy-apple red matching her lips and shiny purse. She looks like money. Yet, now that she has to earn her own way, I’m guessing this outfit came from the Junior League consignment shop she helps keep in business downtown.

After paying, Emma spins with a whirl of her shoulder-length hair and glides to the table, smiling her million-dollar smile. I stand and meet her for a quick hug.

“Girl, you are looking so good! I love the color of that dress and it sure brings out your eyes, but seriously, honey—it looks like a gorgeous pear-shaped sack and makes you look way bigger than you are. You have got to stop hiding your a*s-ets.” She emphasizes a*s with a wicked grin and wiggle of her own as she lowers gracefully into the seat across from me.

I roll my eyes. This isn’t a new line of conversation. Remember, she knew me before neoprene.

“Gosh, I just love your backhanded compliments, Em.” I bat my eyes at her and cup my face in my hands. “Am I glowing?” I slide a baggie of cookies across the table to her. “Here you go, though for that comment, you don’t deserve them.”

“Oh, stuff it. You know I love you.” We both laugh. After taking an appreciative sniff at the opening of the bag, she rolls her eyes heavenward in bliss.

“So how come you can have coffee this afternoon?” Emma has a 9-5 job working as an assistant to a financial advisor. Normally, she only gets an hour for lunch at most.

“Francine had to do something and decided to forward her calls to the answering service. I was able to get away for a while.” She brings her hands down on the table decisively. “Tell me why you had to bake today.” I love to bake, but Emma knows it often means I’m stressed. I blow a lock of hair off my face and tuck it tightly behind my ear, smoothing it a couple of times. Her eyebrows raise in interest as she knows this is a dead giveaway that I’m nervous. My cheeks redden and I drop my hand guiltily. “Okay, now I am really intrigued! I want full details!”

“Okay, so yeah, I guess something happened.” I clear my throat as she rolls her eyes.

“Duh. Talk.”

“So, you know I went to dinner Friday night with my coworkers, then to HoneyBears so they could drink, and I could, well, you know…” I trail off as the cashier brings Emma’s coffee.

When she walks away, Emma picks back up. “Drool over all the lesbians? Yeah, I know. And?”

“And…I met the hottest woman I’ve ever laid eyes on!” My cheeks hot, I tell her about just how we met.

“Oh my gosh! Libby! Were you hurt?! What did she do? What did you do?” Emma is bouncing up and down in her excitement.

“Yeah, actually, it stirred up my back pretty badly, but she bought me a soda. And after I drank it and rested, my pain, like, vanished. Emma, she…she is so hot, and she seemed worried about me, and she made sure I got home safe, and she is amazing!”

“Hallelujah!” She claps her hands together and rubs them gleefully. “I’ve been waiting for something like this to happen! Finally! I want all the details. What does she look like? What’s her name? What does she do? Where does she live? When are you two going out on a date?”

I wish I had answers to all the questions Emma fires at me. “Her name is Jo, but that’s all I know. And I doubt we’ll ever go out, because she is so rich and incredibly hot. Oh, Emma, I just have to tell you that she’s so perfect. Muscular, like she lifts weights, but not too much, you know? Tall. At least 5’11. Her eyes are this incredible shade of dark green with gold streaks with a ring of evergreen around the iris, and they are so intense. Like she could see through me and knew what I was thinking.” I pick up my coffee and take too big a gulp. I sputter and hold the napkin to my mouth.

“I think I need to point out that your eyes are, in fact, glazed over.” Her voice is so dry I have to laugh. “What did you talk about?” Seeing my look, her face gets serious. “Tell me you at least gave her your phone number.”

“Um, not exactly? But we didn’t really talk. I was really hurting, see. I had nerve pains in my leg, and I wrenched my bad knee, and I was really tired. And you should have seen the outfit I had on. Nerd City.”

“Wow, I can’t believe you felt better so quickly if you had nerve pain.” She pauses, waves it away. “Anyway, alright, let me get this straight. You met the woman of your dreams, and she said…not much…and you said…nothing…and then she had someone else drive you home. Did I miss anything?”

I toy with my mug, spinning it in slow circles. The napkin is already in shreds. “Nope. I’d say that’s about accurate. Oh! She did send me a flower.”

“She sent you a flower?”

“Yup. A delicate peach and white rose. With a blue ribbon tied around the vase. And the card said she would see me again. And, oh my gosh, I ran into her at the gas station this morning! But she made me so nervous. Obviously, she knows where I live, but it never occurred to me to give her my phone number.” I thunk my forehead. I definitely don’t say anything about Jo’s eyes looking red. Emma’d think I was really off my rocker. “Oh, Em. I’m such a loser.” I slump back in my chair, feeling pretty miserable.

“Now you stop that right now, young lady.” I hear echoes of her mother in her tone. “I won’t hear that kind of talk about my best friend. You are definitely NOT a loser, as you know when you are in your right mind. Horribly out of practice, I’d say, but definitely not a loser. So what are you going to do about it now?”

“Do? What can I do? She is so out of my league and I looked ridiculous, and I was hurting and both times I was flustered, Em. I was so flustered!” I prop my elbows on the table and drop my face into my upturned palms. “I had no idea what to say. It’s like my brain goes on vacation around her.”

“Libby.” I don’t move. “Elizabeth.” Yup, definitely channeling her mother. I huff and sit up. “Honey, you have to lighten up on yourself. So you met an amazing woman and you couldn’t think of anything eloquent to say. There are worse things, you know.”

“Like what?”

Without missing a beat, Emma begins counting off on her fingers, “You could have drooled all over yourself, you could have told her your life story in a breath, you could have ripped your shirt off and screamed, ‘Take me now you big hunk of love!’, you could—”

“Okay, okay. I get the picture,” I shush her before people start looking, shootting her a grin of gratitude for giving me some perspective. “What can I do? Or no. Gah. Why bother? She won’t be interested in me once she knows what I have is permanent.” I am dangerously close to whining now.

Emma looks at me with one beautifully shaped eyebrow c****d. “When you went to the bar, did you by any chance wear a brace?”

“Yeah, I have for weeks now. And she knew it was there because she had her hands on my knees at one point, and she also definitely saw it today.”

“And we already established that you had your cane with you, right?”

I wave my hand dismissively, not getting her point, “Yeah, both times.”

Emma looks smug. I must really be tired because I’m still not following her train of thought. But she just stares at me and finally it hits me. Why would Jo have done all that if she weren’t interested?

I laugh. “Okay, okay, message received.”

“Here’s what you do. You wait.” She crosses her arms.

“I wait.”

“Yup. And in the meantime, let’s talk about this wardrobe.” Emma has that determined gleam in her eye that always means I’m going to be giving in to her soon.

Here we go again. “Em, we have been over this a million times. I’m just not comfortable wearing tight clothes. As a professional—”

“Bull,” she cuts me off. “Absolute stinking piles of bull.”

I fold my arms.

“Go on, grouch all you want. You know you are full of it. You are so afraid of rejection that you make sure no one notices you.” She leans in. “Well, I see you. And so did Miss Hot and Gallant. Libby, honey, you are beautiful, inside and out. And it’s way past time you let me take you shopping.” She drains her coffee. “You are 27, not 87. So you have a disease. Does that mean you have to give up and check out of life? No. Enough is enough. Do it for Jo. Actually, no. Do it for you! Do it because you deserve to look your best. Do it because you deserve to take a chance.”

I blink the moisture from my eyes and sniffle. Man, did I need to hear that. “Okay, Em. I hear you. Yes. Let’s do this.”

She claps her hands in delight. “Excellent! Tomorrow you are mine! Consignment shops be ready! Besides, I need a new dress.” She waggles her eyebrows and her eyes sparkle.

“Oh?” I know that look. “And what is his name and when are you going out?”

“Gosh, what makes you ask?” She laughs. “His name is David. We met at the grocery store of all places.” She looks truly amazed. Clueless. “Let’s see, he’s a CPA, 5’ 10”, brown hair, brown eyes. He is sexy in a geeky way, and is taking me to dinner Saturday night. So I need a new dress and probably new shoes. And definitely a pretty b*a!” She laughs.

“Deal. Text me.” I rise slowly, pushing off the table and the back of the chair. Emma watches, but knows not to try to help. I return her fierce hug and we are still saying our goodbyes as we go in different directions out the door.